


Pratikara

by CarminaVulcana



Category: Baahubali (Movies)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Gen, Revenge
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-26
Updated: 2019-12-26
Packaged: 2021-02-25 08:41:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,948
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22033183
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CarminaVulcana/pseuds/CarminaVulcana
Summary: Character/Pairing/Relationship: Kattappa & BijjaladevaPrompt: what’s their history?Note: This doesn't contain deaths of canon characters but there are references to OC deaths.
Relationships: Amarendra Baahubali/Devasena, Bijjaladeva/OFC
Comments: 2
Kudos: 4
Collections: Margazhi in Mahishmati 2019





	Pratikara

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Inkn1ght1](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Inkn1ght1/gifts).



All endurance has its limits, but some endurances have no end. In some ways, Katappa felt a rather intimate sort of camaraderie with the imprisoned widow of Amarendra Baahubali. While she endured her days in the cage with a furious grace, he endured his complicity in the kingdom’s crimes against her with eternal shame.

But Devasena was not the first person he had seen tormented by Mahishmati’s rulers. Long before the death of Baahubali, long before the birth of Bhallaladeva, he had seen another soul shackled to a fate she hadn’t deserved.

The crime had been no less heinous and its consequences equally heartbreaking. But the face of the monster had been different.

As Katappa rested his tired, aching body on the hard bed, images from thirty years ago came back to him.

Neelanjana… the regent of Meghavani.

Katappa remembered her painfully well. And even now, the memory of her bitter end sent shivers down his spine.

*****

_Maharani Anandini Devi sat on a low charpoy surrounded by baskets of fresh marigolds. Her fingers worked busily as she pierced the center of each flower and strung it on a thick cotton thread. Her attendants milled about with platters of sweets, gold, and fruits._

_Rajmata Neelanjana Devi of Meghavani was coming with her young son and daughter. Her reputation preceded her in all of the Deccan Peninsula. As the widow of Maharaj Phaneendranath Meghavath, she was respected across the length and breadth of the subcontinent._

_Anandini Devi was eager to form an alliance with her._

_Princess Samruddhi was only eleven but in everyone’s opinion, she was the ideal bride for Vikramadeva. Anandini Devi hoped her son would see that and drop his irrational objections against marrying a child._

_No one was a child at eleven, especially not a princess with so many responsibilities on her shoulders._

_“Maharani, why don’t you seek Yuvarani Samruddhi’s hand for Bijjaladeva,” the rajpurohit asked her. “After all, he is your older son. And he is even ready for marriage, unlike the younger prince.”_

_Anandini Devi closed her eyes and sighed. She did not know how to answer the rajpurohit’s question without lying. The truth was that she had asked for the princess’ hand for Bijjaladeva. But like many others before her, Rajmata Neelanjana Devi had rejected the proposal, citing the older prince’s drinking habit and his propensity for womanizing._

_“Do your work, swamiji,” she said to the priest and walked away._

_She still had to check on Vikramadeva’s clothes for the afternoon. He had been told that the dignitaries from Meghavani were coming for a diplomatic visit. Accordingly, he had been asked to dress for the occasion. But since Anandanini Devi knew the truth, she wanted to make sure that her son was also dressed appropriately to meet his would-be mother-in-law._

*****

Katappa couldn’t bear to recall the rest of that disastrous day and yet, it refused to leave his mind. Like pages from a child’s picture book, the images were too sharp and vivid to ignore as they assaulted his sanity and conscience.

It sufficed to say that Vikramadeva had insulted the Rajmata for her willingness to marry off her young daughter to a man 12 years her senior. Humiliated, Neelanjana Devi had then accepted Bijjaladeva’s proposal.

The wedding had taken place that very day amid the angry but futile protests of Vikramadeva. Ultimately, he had decided against attending the final ceremony and had left for Shakya, his maternal grandmother’s kingdom.

The festivities of Bijjaladeva’s union with Samruddhi had been celebrated in a lavish if subdued manner.

However, actual trouble had begun soon after the wedding.

*****

_“I thank you for saving the honor of my daughter,” Neelanjana Devi said as she draped a fine silk shawl on her new son-in-law’s shoulders. “I hope the Gods bless you and my daughter with all the happiness the heavens have to offer.”_

_She then turned to Maharani Anandini Devi._

_“I will take my daughter back with me but rest assured that as soon as she is mature, she will be returned to you.”_

_Anandani Devi smiled and knelt down to the level of her newest family member._

_“We will wait for you, Samruddhi,” she said and tied a gold thread around the child’s left wrist. “When you come back, we…”_

_“What is this, amma” Bijjaladeva interrupted his mother. “Samruddhi isn’t going back anywhere. She will stay right here with me. She is a married woman now.”_

_“My daughter is not a woman yet,” Neelanjana Devi countered. “In our culture, it is common to marry off our daughters young and return them to their marital home once they attain maturity. My daughter is still a child. She is incapable of being a wife to you yet, son.”_

_“We don’t follow such customs here,” Bijjaladeva snapped. “Once a woman is married here, she does not return to her maternal home. If your daughter leaves here today, she will be considered a castaway. I will not take her back.”_

_The people gathered around for the farewell gasped._

_“Prince, you are being needlessly difficult,” the rajpurohit whispered._

_“She is indeed too young for wifely duties,” an advisor said._

_But Bijjaladeva was not to be moved._

_“No matter how young she is, a married woman is a married woman. Even if she is an infant; if she is married, she is to be seen as a woman. Samruddhi must stay if she wishes to be the Maharani of Mahishmati eventually… or she can forever have her name blackened as the reject of Mahishmati’s noble name._

_“Then that will be the fate of my daughter,” Neelanjana Devi exclaimed, her voice heavy with the burden of Bijjaladeva’s words. “I feel sorry that I ever agreed to marry my daughter to a monster like you.”_

_She then turned to the Rajmata. “We are leaving, Maharani. May the Gods forgive your womb for birthing the spitting image of Ravana.”_

_Anandini Devi did not stop them. There were no words to say, nothing that would change what had transpired. She watched helplessly as the royals of Meghavani climbed into their chariot and drove away._

_But this painful episode did not end there._

_Three days after later, Yuvarani Samruddhi’s body was found, hacked to pieces and strewn about the Vandhana forest that ran all around Mahishmati’s perimeter. Her pale, bloodied face spoke of the unspeakable brutality that she had been subjected to prior to her death. And less than a few feet away from her lacerated feet, her mother was found… again, in a condition too horrifying to describe. Unconscious, grievously injured but alive._

_The local tribespeople who found them, brought them back to the Mahishmati palace. Neelanjana Devi regained consciousness four days after the rescue. But even in that short span of time, no fewer three attempts were made on her life._

_The final attempt took away her tongue and three fingers on her dominant hand._

_“Katappa, I need you to find out who is behind all this” Anandini Devi told the royal slave. But even she knew it was too late._

_Nevertheless, Katappa took his job seriously and it didn’t take him long to figure out who was behind the gruesome attacks._

_The answer chilled the Rajmata’s very soul._

_She fell to the floor when Katappa’s trembling voice uttered the name of her older son._

_“No…” she gasped. “This… cannot be.”_

_“Manasukha saw it with his own two eyes, Rajmata,” the slave’s voice was a low, tortured whisper. “Neelanjana Devi’s words cut him too deep. He… he… was unwilling to let the princess lea…”_

_“ENOUGH,” the Rajmata shouted. “I have heard enough.”_

_Katappa looked up and for the first time in life, he looked a member of the royal family in the eye. “What will we do?” his own remorse and rage warred within him to make sense of the violence committed by the older yuvaraj._

_“We will annex Meghavani,” Anandini Devi said after thinking for a few minutes._

_“What?”_

_“I said, we will annex Meghavani. Their subjects will now be our subjects. They armory will be Mahishmati’s armory. Their kingdom will be a protectorate of our empire.”_

_“And their queen, Rajmata?” Katappa couldn’t help but ask. “What of their queen? What of the child she lost?”_

_“We lost a daughter-in-law as well. I am announcing three full days of state-wide mourning for Princess Samruddhi Chandrayani of the Sarvasteera Dynasty. Have the announcement made. And after the final rites tomorrow, send Neelanjana Devi back to Meghavani. But remember to send with her our soldiers and Savanthakumara. He will run the government there under her highness on our behalf.”_

_The decision of the rajmata felt bitter, unjust, and heavy-handed to Katappa. But duty-bound, he had no option except to follow the queen mother’s orders._

_The next day, Neelanjana Devi was forced into her chariot in chains. Her voiceless mouth strained futilely to form words of dissent, of disapproval, of misery. Lips gnashing against teeth, the roof of her mouth unable to project her soundless screams—her spectacle of humiliation was made complete by Bijjaladeva’s cruel presence at the palace gates._

_“Nnnnghh,” she gurgled. “nnnnmhh.” It wasn’t hard to tell that she was trying to simply say, ‘no.’ No to what was being done to her. No to what had been done to her daughter. And no to what was going to be done to her kingdom._

_But even as her hands and legs flailed about while she was manhandled and locked into the chariot, her swollen eyes did not leave the hard, stern visage of Anandini Devi._

_Bijjaladeva might have taken the knife to Samruddhi’s young body, but it was his mother’s willingness to save him that dealt the death blow to the last of her brutalized memory._

_Barely three weeks after that unceremonious departure, Meghavani also lost its queen-- to suicide by poison._

*****

Katappa was glad for Devasena’s resilience, her bravery, and her unbroken spirit. Hadn’t Bijjaladeva and his brat taken from her the same things that they had taken from Neelanjana Devi? Hadn’t Sivagami Devi retraced the footsteps of her own mother-in-law in bringing about the doom of yet another blameless woman.

Were the queen mothers of Mahishmati cursed to bring about misfortune upon their daughters-in-law?

These questions had been buried deep in his heart for decades. During the years spent with Baahubali, Katappa had allowed time to lull him into a false sense of security. Like everyone else, he had put his naïve faith in Amarendra’s capable hands and his illusion of immortality.

But where had that gotten him?

To those same crossroads where he had stood over 57 years ago.

Except this time, the fallen queen refused to find contentment in escape.

She wanted revenge. She wanted retribution. She wanted blood.

Didn’t he, Katappa, want the same things?

Didn’t he want Bijjaladeva to burn alongside his wretch of a son on that pyre that Devasena was building?

Oh, he couldn’t wait for that day.

But a saner, morose part of him knew it was all nothing but fanciful thinking.

Mahendra Baahubali was dead like his father.

There would be no revenge. There would be no retribution. There would be no blood.

Only cold ashes that would, at some point, be swept away by the housekeeping staff of the palace. He was sure he would follow Devasena in death. Because only then, he would be free to fall at Baahubali’s feet and cry for forgiveness.

The old man’s tormented thoughts kept him company every night as he crossed out days on the walls of his unfurnished quarters.

He waited for release in death.

But he didn’t know justice was coming for them all, following a plain wooden mask that hid destiny’s laughing face behind it.


End file.
